author
A. V. (Andrew Valentine) Kirwan
1804–1870
Best remembered for lively writing on French culture and the rituals of the dinner table, this 19th-century Irish-born barrister turned his curiosity into books that still feel distinctive today.
1 Audiobook
Host and Guest : a book about dinners, dinner-giving, wines, and desserts
by A. V. (Andrew Valentine) Kirwan
About the author
An Irish-born barrister who later lived in London, A. V. Kirwan wrote for periodicals including New Monthly Magazine and Fraser's. The surviving reference sources on him are fairly sparse, but they consistently describe him as both a lawyer and a man of letters.
His best-known books include Modern France: Its Journalism, Literature and Society (1863) and Host and Guest: A Book About Dinners, Dinner-Giving, Wines, and Desserts (1864). Those titles show the range of his interests: on one side, journalism and literary culture in France; on the other, the social art of dining and hospitality.
Kirwan died in 1870. I couldn't confirm a reliable portrait image from the available source pages, so no profile image is included here.